Enphase Energy has opened U.S. pre-orders for the IQ Battery C80, the company's first commercial battery storage system. The 80-kWh AC-coupled unit delivers up to 40 kVA of continuous power and houses its batteries and microinverters within a single enclosure. The launch moves Enphase, which built its business on panel-level microinverters and residential home energy systems, into a commercial segment where DC-coupled systems built around central inverters are more common.

The system pairs with IQ9N-3P and IQ9S-3P Commercial Microinverters at 480 V, as well as IQ8P-3P and IQ8H-3P Microinverters at 208 V, forming an all-AC solar-plus-storage architecture that requires no central inverters or high-voltage DC coupling, in contrast to the DC-coupled designs that dominate commercial solar-plus-storage. It is offered in a 208-V/33-kVA configuration for multifamily and small-commercial projects and a 480-V/40-kVA configuration for large commercial projects. Both versions are UL 3141- and UL 9540A-certified.

The IQ Battery C80 scales modularly from 80 kWh to 2 MWh and supports demand charge management and virtual power plant programs. Demand charge management uses stored energy to reduce a facility's peak power draw, the component of many commercial utility bills that is set by the highest demand reached during a billing period rather than total energy consumed, while virtual power plants aggregate fleets of networked batteries that utilities and grid operators can dispatch as a shared resource. Its lithium iron phosphate batteries — the chemistry most widely used in stationary storage, favored for its thermal stability — operate across a temperature range of -22°F to 131°F and rely on an internal active air cooling system. A built-in fire detection system and emergency stop function are designed to prevent thermal runaway. The battery can also pair with third-party three-phase inverters for retrofit applications.

Enphase states that the IQ Battery C80 will be manufactured in domestic factories and will be FEOC compliant. Those qualifiers matter for U.S. incentive eligibility: FEOC restrictions stem from Inflation Reduction Act tax-credit rules that condition certain clean-energy credits on avoiding restricted foreign entities in the supply chain, and domestic manufacturing can factor into additional domestic-content incentives.

"We designed the IQ Battery C80 to make commercial storage simpler to deploy, easier to scale, and more resilient," said Aaron Gordon, senior VP and general manager of the systems business unit at Enphase Energy. "With 208-V and 480-V configurations, it will serve applications ranging from multifamily properties to large commercial and industrial facilities."

IQ Battery C80 shipments are expected to begin in the first half of 2027, and the system carries a 15-year limited warranty.

News item from Enphase Energy.